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Toward the end of the 1960s, the growth of NIH budgets slowed considerably,
in part because of inflation in the U.S. economy and the advent of new
programs such as Medicare and Medicaid that competed for congressional
"health" funding. Tighter budgets also led to debate over the relative
efficacy of unfettered basic research versus goal-directed applied research.
In the early 1970s Congress authorized major initiatives against two chronic
killers, cancer and heart disease. The National Cancer Act of 1971 created
fifteen new research, training, and demonstration cancer centers. The
following year the National Heart, Blood Vessel, Lung, and Blood Act mandated
an expanded program against all aspects of heart disease, including high
blood pressure, elevated cholesterol levels, stroke, and particular blood
diseases such as sickle-cell anemia. The AIDS crisis of the 1980s similarly
provided at first an opportunity for goal-directed research quickly to
uncover an effective therapy or vaccine. When no quick solution was forthcoming,
leaders of the research effort against AIDS began to emphasize study of
basic immunological processes as the most efficient strategy to find an
effective therapy or preventative.
Thorny social and ethical issues were also raised in the 1970s by the
first recombinant DNA experiments . Dr. DeWitt Stetten, Jr., then the
NIH Deputy Director for Science, chaired a national committee of scientists
to develop guidelines for the new technology. Intramural investigators
associated with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
conducted biosafety studies which helped to demonstrate that recombinant
DNA research did not pose great risk of unleashing deadly novel organisms.
Since that time, research on the molecular level has transformed the way
scientists study most diseases. In the late 1980s, NIH and the Department
of Energy launched the Human Genome Project with the goal of mapping and
sequencing the entire collection of human genes. In the twenty-first century,
the medical, ethical, and legal implications of this work will have profound
effects on human societies.
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Credits
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Open-heart surgery was performed
at the NIH Clinical Center using hypothermia. |
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Dr. DeWitt Stetten, Jr. |
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